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Menelaus

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Parentage of Agamemnon and Menelaus

Source	Atreus	Pleisthenes	Aerope	Cleola
Il & Od	✓
Hes. Cat. of Women	?	?	✓
Eur Helen	✓		✓
Eur Orestes	✓		✓
Eur Iph. in Taur.	✓
Soph Ajax			✓
Hyg Fab 97	✓		✓
Apd 3.2.2		✓	✓
Apd E.3.12	✓		✓
"Homer" (Sch Il 1.7)	✓		✓
"Hesiod" (Sch Il 1.7)		✓	?
"Homer" (Sch Tz Ex in Il 1.122)	✓		✓
"Hesiod" (Sch Tz Ex in Il 1.122)		✓	?
Dict. Cret.		✓	✓
"Hesiod, Aeschylus, and some others" (Tz Ex in Il 1.122)		✓		✓

Sources

Ancient

Apollodorus

3.2.2

And Catreus gave Aerope and Clymene to Nauplius to sell into foreign lands; and of these two Aerope became the wife of Plisthenes, who begat Agamemnon and Menelaus; and Clymene became the wife of Nauplius, who became the father of Oeax and Palamedes.

3.11.1

Now Menelaus had by Helen a daughter Hermione and, according to some, a son Nicostratus;¹ and by a female slave Pieris, an Aetolian, or, according to Acusilaus, by Tereis, he had a son Megapenthes;² and by a nymph Cnossia, according to Eumelus, he had a son Xenodamus.

¹ Homer definitely affirms （Hom. Od. 4.12-14; compare Hom. Il. 3.174ff.） that Helen had only one child, her daughter Hermione. But according to Hesiod, whose verses are quoted by the Scholiast on Soph. El. 539, Helen afterwards bore a son Nicostratus to Menelaus. Compare Scholiast on Hom. Od. iv.11, who tells us further that according to more recent writers Helen had a son Corythus or Helenus by Alexander （Paris）. According to Dictys Cretensis v.5, Helen had three sons by Alexander, namely, Bunomus, Corythus, and Idaeus, who were accidentally killed at Troy through the collapse of a vaulted roof. The Scholiast on Hom. Il. iii.175, says that the Lacedaemonians worshipped two sons of Helen, to wit, Nicostratus and Aethiolas. He further mentions, on the authority of Ariaethus, that Helen had by Menelaus a son Maraphius, from whom the Persian family of the Maraphions was descended. See Dindorf's edition of the Scholiast on the Iliad vol. i. pp. 147ff., vol. iii. p. 171. According to one account, Helen had a daughter by Theseus before she was married to Menelaus; this daughter was Iphigenia; Helen entrusted her to her sister Clytaemnestra, who reared the child and passed her off on her husband Agamemnon as her own offspring. This account of the parentage of Iphigenia was supported by the authority of Stesichorus and other poets. See Paus. 2.22.6ff.; Ant. Lib. 27. Sophocles represents Menelaus as having two children before he sailed for Troy（Soph. Elec. 539ff.).

² Compare Hom. Od. 4.10-12.

E.3.12

Of the Mycenaeans, Agamemnon, son of Atreus and Aerope: a hundred ships. Of the Lacedaemonians, Menelaus, son of Atreus and Aerope: sixty ships.

Cinaethon

fr. 3 [= Porphyry ap. schol. (D) Iliad 3.175]

From Helen and Menelaus Ariaithos records a son Maraphius, from whom the Maraphians of Persia descend; or as Cinaethon says, Nicostratus.³¹

³¹ For Nicostratus see “Hesiod,” fr. 175.

Dictys Cretensis (4th century AD)

1.1

Also Menelaus and his older brother Agamemnon, the sons of Aerope and Plisthenes, came to get their share. (They had a sister, Anaxibia, who at that time was married to Nestor.) People often thought that their father was Atreus, because when their real father, Plisthenes, died young without having made a name for himself, Atreus, pitying their plight, had taken them in and brought them up like princes.

Euripides

Helen

390–392

before you ever begot my father, Atreus, to whom were born, from his marriage with Airope, Agamemnon and myself, Menelaos, a famous pair;

Iphigenia in Tauris

4–5

Atreus, whose children are Menelaus and Agamemnon;

Orestes

16

... from Atreus and Aerope of Crete were born the famous Agamemnon, if he really was famous, and Menelaus.

Hesiod

fr. 137 Most [= fr. 194 MW]

137 (194 MW)

137

a Schol. D in Hom. Il. 1.7 (p. 21 van Thiel²)

a Scholia on Homer’s Iliad

According to Homer, Agamemnon was the son of Pelops’ son Atreus, and his mother was Aerope; but according to Hesiod he was the son of Pleisthenes.

b Tzetz. Exeg. Il. 1.122 (p. 68.19 Hermann)

b Tzetzes’ commentary on Homer’s Iliad

Agamemnon, and Menelaus likewise, are considered to be children of Atreus’ son Pleisthenes according to Hesiod and Aeschylus, but according to the poet (i.e., Homer) and everyone they were simply sons of Atreus himself. . . . According to Hesiod, Aeschylus, and some others, Pleisthenes was the son of Atreus and Aerope, and the children of Pleisthenes and Dias’ daughter Cleolla were Agamemnon, Menelaus, and Anaxibia. Because Pleisthenes died young, they were brought up by their grandfather Atreus, and so they are considered by many to be Atreids.

c Schol. in Tzetz. ad loc. (p. 11 Papathomopoulos)

c Scholia on Tzetzes’ commentary on Homer’s Iliad

According to Homer, Agamemnon and Menelaus were the sons of Pelops’ son Atreus and of Aerope from Crete, Catreus’ daughter; according to Hesiod they were the sons of Pleisthenes, a hermaphrodite or lame, who wore women’s clothing.

fr. 138 Most [= fr. 195 MW]

138 (195 MW; 91 H) 1–Scutum 18: P. Oxy. 2494A; 1–Scutum 5: P. Oxy. 2355

138 1–Shield 18: Oxyrhynchus papyrus; 1–Shield 5: Oxyrhynchus papyrus

from Crete] he¹ led off [

the daughter of Catreus] and of the beautiful-haired Naead

] beautiful-ankled Aeropea

] to his home, to be called [his dear wife. [5]

she bore]bius, and warlike Menelaus and godly Agamemnon, who over spacious [Argos

to his father, was lord and ruler. [5]

¹ Pleisthenes

• Gantz, p. 552

fragmentary lines of that poem [the Ehoiai] just preceding the tale of Alkmene appear to attest that Aerope (not Kleola) is the mother of Agamemnon and Menelaos (and a third son: Anaxibios?), although whether by Atreus or Pleisthenes we cannot tell (Hes fr 195 MW).

fr. 155.94 [= fr. 204 MW; 110 H]

She [Helen] bore beautiful-ankled Hermione in the halls,

fr. 248 Most [= fr. 175 MW; *9 H]

248 (175 MW; *9 H) Schol. in Soph. El. 539a (p. 186 Xenis), de filiis Helenae

248¹ Scholia on Sophocles’ Electra

Hesiod:

She² bore Hermione to spear-famed Menelaus

and last of all she bore Nicostratus, scion of Ares

¹ In the Catalogue of Women (Fr. 155, ll. 94ff.), the birth of Helen’s daughter, Hermione, is followed immediately after by Zeus’ decision to end the heroic age; the first line of this fragment duplicates Fr. 155, lines 94–95, and it is not clear where one could place the second line (even assuming that it followed the first line directly, although ὁπλότατον, “last of all,” may suggest that other children were named in one or more intervening lines that have been lost). From the Great Ehoiai perhaps?

² That is, Helen.

Homer

Iliad

3.175

[Helen:] "and my daughter, well-beloved"

11.126–131

lord Agamemnon took, the twain being in one car, and together were they seeking to drive the swift horses, for the shining reins had slipped from their hands, and the two horses were running wild; but he rushed against them like a lion, [130] the son of Atreus [Ἀτρεΐδης], and the twain made entreaty to him from the car: “Take us alive, thou son of Atreus, [Ἀτρέος υἱέ] and accept a worthy ransom;

Odyssey

4.11–12

the stalwart Megapenthes, who was his son well-beloved, born of a slave woman;

4.12–14

for to Helen the gods vouchsafed issue no more after that she had at the first borne her lovely child, Hermione, who had the beauty of golden Aphrodite.

4.462

Ἀτρέος υἱέ (son of Atreus)

15.99–125

And Menelaus himself went down to his vaulted treasure-chamber, [100] not alone, for with him went Helen and Megapenthes. But when they came to the place where his treasures were stored, the son of Atreus took a two-handled cup, and bade his son Megapenthes bear a mixing bowl of silver. And Helen came up to the chests [105] in which were her richly-broidered robes, that she herself had wrought. One of these Helen, the beautiful lady, lifted out and bore away, the one that was fairest in its broideries, and the amplest. It shone like a star, and lay beneath all the rest. Then they went forth through the house until they came to [110] Telemachus; and fair-haired Menelaus spoke to him, and said: “Telemachus, may Zeus, the loud-thundering lord of Here, verily bring to pass for thee thy return, even as thy heart desires. And of all the gifts that lie stored as treasures in my house, I will give thee that one which is fairest and costliest. [115] I will give thee a well-wrought mixing-bowl. It is all of silver, and with gold are the rims thereof gilded, the work of Hephaestus; and the warrior Phaedimus, king of the Sidonians, gave it me, when his house sheltered me as I came thither; and now I am minded to give it to thee.” [120] So saying, the warrior, son of Atreus, placed the two-handled cup in his hands. And the strong Megapenthes brought the bright mixing-bowl of silver and set it before him, and fair-cheeked Helen came up with the robe in her hands, and spoke, and addressed him:

Hyginus

Fabulae [Grant]

97

Agamemnon, son of Atreus and Aërope, from Mycenae, with a hundred ships;

117

Strophius had married Agamemnon's sister, Astyoche

Pausanias

2.18.6

When Orestes became king of the Lacedaemonians, they themselves consented to accept him for they considered that the sons of the daughter of Tyndareus had a claim to the throne prior to that of Nicostratus and Megapenthes, who were sons of Menelaus by a slave woman.

2.29.4

the grandson of Crisus was Pylades, whose father was Strophius, son of Crisus, while his mother was Anaxibi, sister of Agamemnon.

3.19.9

The name of Therapne is derived from the daughter of Lelex, and in it is a temple of Menelaus; they say that Menelaus and Helen were buried here. The account of the Rhodians is different. They say that when Menelaus was dead, and Orestes still a wanderer, Helen was driven out by Nicostratus and Megapenthes and came to Rhodes, where she had a friend in Polyxo,

Scholia on Iliad

1.7 [= Hesiod fr. 137a Most = fr. 194 MW]

According to Homer, Agamemnon was the son of Pelops' son Atreus, and his mother was Aerope; but according to Hesiod he was the son of Pleisthenes.

Gantz, p. 552

Iliad scholia tell us that while Homer makes Agamemnon the son of Atreus and Aerope (she is not mentioned in the Iliad or Odyssey; presumably the scholiast gets this from the Epic Cycle), in Hesiod he and his brother are the sons of Pleisthenes (ΣA Il 1.7 = Hes fr. 194 MW).

2.249

Gantz, p. 552

Another Iliad scholion repeats this idea, although without mentioning Hesiod; it does cite Porphyrios and "many others" for it, and adds that Pleisthenes died young, having done nothing of note, whereupon his sons were raised by Atreus (ΣA Il 2.249)

3.175 [= Cinaethon fr. 3]

From Helen and Menelaus Ariaithos records a son Maraphius, from whom the Maraphians of Persia descend; or as Cinaethon says, Nicostratus.³¹

³¹ For Nicostratus see “Hesiod,” fr. 175.

Scholia on Tzetzes' Exegesis in Iliadem 1.122

Hesiod fr. 137c Most [= fr. 194 MW]

Accordimg to Homer, Agamemmnon and Menelaus were the sons of Pelops' son Atreus and Aerope from Crete, Catreus' daughter, according to Hesiod they were the sons of Pleisthenes, a hemaphrodite or lame, who wore women's clothing.

Gantz, p. 553

Tzetzes offers one other curious bit of information, not in his Exegesis but in his scholia to that work: while in Homer Agamemnon and Menelaos are the sons of Atreus, son of Pelops, in Hesiod they are the sons of Pleisthenes, the hermaphrodite or lame one, who wore a woman's mantle (addendum to Hes fr. 194 MW).²⁴

Sophocles

Ajax 1295–1297.

Jebb's translation

And you yourself were born from a Cretan mother, whose father found a stranger straddling her and who was consigned by him to be prey for the mute fish.

Lloyd-Jones' translation:

And you yourself are the son of a Cretan mother, whom your father, finding a lover with her, sent to be destroyed by dumb fishes.

Electra 539

Had not Menelaus two children

Tzetzes

Allegories of the Iliad

Prolegomena

508–511

The Greeks were commanded by two kings:

the famous Agamemnon and Menelaos

sons, according to most authorities, of Atreus and Aerope;

according to others, the children of Pleisthenes and Kleole.

Exegesis in Iliadem

1.122

Hesiod fr. 137b Most

Agamemnon, and Menelaus likewise, are considered to be children of Atreus' son Pleisthenes according to Hesiod and Aeschylus, but according to the poet (i.e. Homer) and everyone they were simply sons of Atreus himself. ... According to Hesiod, Aeschylus, and some others, Pleisthenes was the son of Atreus and Aerope, and the children of Pleisthenes and Dias' daughter Cleolla were Agamemnon, Menelaus, and Anaxibia. Because Pleisthenes died young, they were brought up by their grandfather Atreus, and so they are considered by many to be Atreids.

(Evelyn-White pp. 202–203)

Agamemnon and Menelaus likewise according to Hesiod and Aeschylus are regarded as the sons of Pleisthenes, Atreus' son. And according to Hesiod, Pleisthenes was a son of Atreus and Aerope, and Agamemnon, Menelaus and Anaxibia were the children of Pleisthenes and Cleolla the daughter of Dias.

Gantz, p. 552

Tzetzes (in his Exegesis in Iliadem) explains further what we will have already guessed, that in this version Pleisthenes is the son of Atreus. He goes on to say that for Hesiod, Aischylos, and others, Pleisthenes is born of Aerope, and that this Pleisthenes, wed to Kleola, daughter of Atreus' brother Dias (she is thus his own first cousin), begets Agamemnon and Menelaos, and Anaxibia (pp. 68-69 Hermann, reproduced in part as Hes fr. 194 MW).^{23 [Pelops' children here (which in fact match perfectly those reported by Σ Or 4) are in part omitted by Merkelbach and West. For the form "Kleolla" actually reported by Tzetzes, see West 1985.111-12.]}

Modern

Collard and Cropp

2008a

p. 517

myth more commonly has Atreus as Aerope’s husband, and Menelaus and Agamemnon their sons, not Pleisthenes as the husband and father (see further our Introduction to Pleisthenes).

2008b

p. 79

Not much can be said about the subject of this play. Pleisthenes is an obscure figure, unknown or ignored in the Homeric poems but apparently identified in the Hesiodic Catalogue of Women (F 194) as a son of Atreus; in this tradition Pleisthenes and (probably) Aerope, rather than Atreus and Aerope, were the parents of Agamemnon and Menelaus.¹ In Cretan Women Euripides seems to have had Pleisthenes take Aerope as his wife after her expulsion from Crete (see our Introduction to that play). In 5th-century poetry Agamemnon and Menelaus could be referred to both as Atreus’ sons and as Pleisthenes’ offspring (see e.g. Aeschylus, Agamemnon 1569, 1602). According to the [cont.]

¹ Alternatively Pleisthenes is a son, or bastard son, of Pelops, and thus Atreus' brother or half-brother (Schol. on Pindar, Olympians 1.89). A Pleisthenes son of Thyestes (Hyginus, Fab. 88.1, Seneca, Thyestes 726) and a Pleisthenes son of Menelaus and Helen (Cypria fr. 10 Davies) are best regarded as separate inventions.

p. 80

Byzantine scholar John Tzetzes, ‘Hesiod’ explained that the two had become Atreus’ heirs after Pleisthenes died prematurely, and that Pleisthenes had been lame and sexually ambiguous;2 but it is not clear whether these details really stem from early mythical traditions (as Papathomopoulos argues) or from later rationalizations of conflicting legends about their parentage.

Fowler

p. 529

§18.2.2 MEGAPENTHES AND THE CHILDREN OF MENELAOS (Akous. fr. 41; Eumel. fr. 6)

Akous. fr. 41 says that Megapenthes was the illegitimate son of Menelaos and a slave woman Tereis. Homer has a role for this son in Odyssey 4 and 14, and mentions his slave mother at 4.12, without naming her. This started the game of guessing her identity. The scholia to the Odyssey passage and Apollodorus relate some of the suggestions, most of which are merely ethnics, a common way of naming slaves.²⁶ Akousilaos' 'Tereis', though not an ethnic, may have Thracian associations (cf. Tereus); it is a unique name (not in LGPN), and could be corrupt (comapre variants cited in the apparatus). Eumel. fr. 6, quoted by Apollodorus in the same place, mentions another illegitimate son, Xenodamos (if he were legitimate, he would have mentioned his mother; Κνωσσία, unattested as a proper name, is another ethnic).

Apollodorus also mentions Nikostratos as another child of Menelaos and Helen, (a slave was the mother says Paus. 2.18.6, 3.19.9). In the Iliad (3.175), Helen ... but both Nikostratos and Hermione were known to Hesiod (fr. 175) and Kinaithon (fr. 3), ... Nikostratus' name reflects his father's victory, so we may infer that he was an invention of the Cyclic poet with the Odyssey behind him (West on Od. 4.12).

Gantz

p. 223

In chapter 5 ... Pausanias goes on to ... while Krisos' son Strophios became by Anaxibia (sister of Agamemnon) the father of Pylades (.29.4)

p. 322

But a two-line fragment of the same poem [The Catalogue of Women] cited elsewhere seems to say that Helen after Hermione also bore Nikostratos as the youngest of her children (Hes fr 175 MW). The fragment stops before we can be sure that Menelaos is the father, although this seems the understanding of the epic poet Kinaithon (fr. 3 PEG) and the Alexandrian Lysimachos (382F12) who with others also attest the child.^{16 [West (1985.119) concludes that this child Nikostratos was born to Helen and Menelaos after the Trojan War. He suggests too that the two lines of fr. 175 have been juxtaposed by the scholiast who cites them, with the first line simply variantly recalled form of fr. 204.94 (Hermione) and the second (Nikostratos) standing alone at a later point in the poem.]} ... The Kypria appears to have known yet another child of Helen and Menelaos, one Pleisthenes (fr 12 PEG); the implication of our scholiast source is that this child was in lieu of Nikostratos, since he juxtaposes the information to that from Lysimachos.

p. 552

Homer never mentions him [Pleisthenes], either in Iliad 2's succession account or elsewhere, and while the standard epithet Atridês can me simply "descendant of Atreus," both the Iliad and the Odyssey on occasion call Agamemnon or Menelaos specifically a son of Atreus. But the Hesiodic Corpus saw matters differently: Iliad scholia tell us that while Homer makes Agamemnon the son of Atreus and Aerope (she is not mentioned in the Iliad or Odyssey; presumably the scholiast gets this from the Epic Cycle), in Hesiod he and his brother are the sons of Pleisthenes (ΣA Il 1.7 = Hes fr. 194 MW). Another Iliad scholion repeats this idea, although without mentioning Hesiod; it does cite Porphyrios and "many others" for it, and adds that Pleisthenes died young, having done nothing of note, whereupon his sons were raised by Atreus (ΣA Il 2.249). Tzetzes (in his Exegesis in Iliadem) explains further what we will have already guessed, that in this version Pleisthenes is the son of Atreus. He goes on to say that for Hesiod, Aischylos, and others, Pleisthenes is born of Aerope, and that this Pleisthenes, wed to Kleola, daughter of Atreus' brother Dias (she is thus his own first cousin), begets Agamemnon and Menelaos, and Anaxibia (pp. 68-69 Hermann, reproduced in part as Hes fr. 194 MW).^{23 [Pelops' children here (which in fact match perfectly those reported by Σ Or 4) are in part omitted by Merkelbach and West. For the form "Kleolla" actually reported by Tzetzes, see West 1985.111-12.]} Here too we find the father dying young, so that the grandfather Atreus raises the sons who come to be thought of as his. Whether the "Hesiodic" source for all this could be the Ehoiai is unclear, for fragmentary lines of that poem just preceding the tale of Alkmene appear to attest that Aerope (not Kleola) is the mother of Agamemnon and Menelaos (and a third son: Anaxibios?), although whether by Atreus or Pleisthenes we cannot tell (Hes fr 195 MW). If that is correct, then either Tzetzes has drawn some of this information from his other named sources alone, or his reference to "Hesiod" intends another part of the Hesiodic Corpus.

We should note here (as likely happens in Euripides) that a father adopting [cont.]

p. 553

his sons' children might possibly marry the mother as well; thus it would be no surprise to find Aerope (or even Kleola) in some accounts married first to Pleisthenes then Atreus. But in the scholia to the Orestes (where Dias is again a brother of Atreus), we find just the opposite: here Atreus marries Kleola, daughter of Dias, she who was the wife of Pleisthenes in Tzetzes, the two of them become the parents of the (infirm of body) Pleisthenes (Σ Or 4). We might suppose that the roles of Aerope and Kleola have simply been reversed, were it not that Pleisthenes marries someone quite new, one Eriphyle by whom he becomes the father of Agamemnon, Menelaos, and Anaxibia.

p. 572

scholia add for the Kypria that Helen also takes her child Pleistenes with her to Cyprus, ... (fr 12 PEG)

p. 573

Regarding offspring of the adulterous pair [Helen and Paris], Odyssey 4 begins by noting that the gods granted Helen only one child, Hermione (Od 4.12-14); given the context this might mean only one child from Menelaos, but the wording suggests otherwise. As we saw in chapter 11 Kinaithon and the Ehoiai mention a son [of Helen] Nikostratos (fr 3 PEG; Hes fr 175 MW), and the Lakedaimonians are cited for two sons Nikostratos and Aitholas (ΣA il 3.175); The Kypria's Pleisthenes seems nowhere else mentioned.

Grimal

s.v. Menelaus

(Μενέλαος) The brother of Agamemnon and the husband of Helen. According to the accepted version of the story which is followed by the Iliad Menelaus was the son of Atreus, king of Mycenae, and a member of the race of Pelops (Table 2). His mother was the Cretan AEROPE, the daughter of Catreus, who was brought to Mycenae by Nauplius after her father had turned her out of his house for an intrigue with a slave. A later tradition gives PLEISTHENES, one of the sons of ATREUS, as father of Agamemnon and Menelaus rather than Atreus himself, but even the authors who support this view agree that Pleisthenes died young and that Menelaus and his brother were brought up by Atreus.

When young ...The children of this marriage [between Menelaus and Helen] were Hermione (the only child by the Iliad and Odyssey) and a son, Nicostratus (Table 13). Late authors give the names of other children as Aethiolas, Thronius, Morrhaphius, Pleisthenes the younger and Melita. Nicostratus and Atethiolas were worshipped in Sparta in the historical period. During Helen's absense Menelaus had a son, MEGAPENTHES, by a slave girl. He gave him this name because of the great grief he felt at having been abandonded by his wife. He also had another son Xenodamus, by another slave girl, called Cnossia (doubtless a Cretan, whose name indicated that her birthplace was the city og Cnossos). The legend that Helen was banished by Nicostratus and Megapenthes after the death of Menelaus derives from this tradition.

Hard

p. 355

Although there was disagreement on whether she married Atreus of Pleisthenes (an obscure figure who was sometimes interposed into the Mycenean king-list between Atreus and Agamemnon, see p. 508), she became the mother of Agamemnon and Menelaos in either case.

p. 441

Although Hermione is the only child of Helen and Menelaos in the Homeric epics, the couple are sometimes credited with a son too, Nikostratos (Victorious Army), whos name would suggest that he was born after the Trojan War. Or eles Nikostratus was an illegitimate son of Menelaos by a slave girl, as is the case with Megapenthes, who was fathers by the king shortly after the abduction of Helen, hence his name (Great Sorrow).^{22 [Hes fr. 175; Apollod. 3.11.1; Paus. 2.18.5 (Nikostratus illegitimate like Megapenthes).]}

p. 507

Atreus left two young sons AGAMEMNON and MENELAOS, ...

p. 508

Agamemnon and Menelaos are sometimes described as the sons of PLEISTHENES, son of Atreus, rather than as sons of Atreus himself.^{178 [Hes. fr. 194, 195.]} It is stated in this connection that Atreus was married to his niece Kleola or Kleolla, a daughter of Dias, son of Pelops, while Pleisthenes was married to Aerope; or else the pattern is inverted and Atreus is said to have married Aerope as usual while Pleisthenes married Kleola.^{179 [Aerope seems to be the mother of Menelaos in the papyrus fragment in Hes. fr. 195, even if Tzetzes (under fr. 194) quotes 'Hesiod' as saying that Menelaos and Agamemnon were chidren of Pleisthenes and Kleolla. According to Apollod. 3.2.2, Nauplios married Aerope to Pleisthenes, who fathers A. and M. by her (a story probably derived from Euripides, see schol. Soph. Ajax 1297).]} This makes little difference since Pleisthenes is a shadowy figure who is said to have died prematurely, leaving his sons to be reared by Atreus.^{180 [Schol. Il. 2.249.]}

p. 566

the father of STROPHIOS, who became a brother-in-law of Agamemnon by marrying his sister Anaxibia.^{99 [Paus. 2.29.4]}

Parada

s.v. Menelaus

King of Sparta after Tyndareus. ...

Tripp

s.v. Menelaüs

A king of Sparta.

A. Menelaus and Agamemnon, often called the Atreidae, were sons of Atreus and Aërope, or according to some versions, of Atreus' son Pleithenes and Cleolla. ...